


If You Love Someone

by cytherea



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Adult Content, Angst, Break Up, Canon Het Relationship, Canon Relationship, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Growing Up, HP: EWE, HP: Epilogue? What Epilogue?, Post-Book(s), Sexual Content, Unhealthy Relationships, Vanilla
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-12
Updated: 2011-11-12
Packaged: 2017-10-26 00:16:01
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,209
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/276447
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cytherea/pseuds/cytherea
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I'm going to leave, and maybe then I can bloody well gain back some of my self-respect."</p><p>He looked up at her, stricken, and met her gaze. Her eyes were bright, but not with fury or tears, more with the sort of steely determination he remembered from their school days. "But, 'Mione," he replied, feeling lost. "What do you mean?"</p><p>"I mean that I'm losing myself here, in this drab little flat in this tiny little town," she told him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	If You Love Someone

**Author's Note:**

> Harry Potter does not belong to me; I am not making any money off of this writing project and am doing it solely for my own twisted amusement. Harry Potter does, on the other hand, belong to JK Rowling, Scholastic, Bloomsbury, Warner Bros, and anybody else who JK says owns a part of it -- this list does, most assuredly, not include myself.

"I don't see why you're getting so worked up over this," she told him tartly, gathering another armload of clothing out of the dresser drawer in front of her. It felt like she was taking another armload of his heart out of his chest. "Honestly, Ron, it's not like you didn't see this coming; you said it yourself last week, that you were surprised it had taken  _this_  long."

"I didn't…" he muttered, shaking his head. He couldn't seem to figure out what to say, what to do, what could possibly make her change her mind on this, so he just sat there on the bed, hunched over, with his hands on his knees and staring at the floor while watching her quick, efficient movements out of the corner of his eye. It was like, if he didn't look at what she was doing directly, maybe it wouldn't actually happen. He knew that wasn't really the case, but the irrational, childish part of him hoped that maybe it would be true, anyway, if he just tried hard enough.

"Honestly, Ron," she said again, dropping the clothing into the suitcase in front of her; it was nearly full. "You've known all along that things weren't ever  _really_  going to work out the way you'd been wanting them to. I'm never going to be a second Molly, even if I love you. I just  _can't_ see myself as a housewitch, mending your socks and cooking up fried mush your dinner when you get home from being the second string Keeper on a minor league team." He winced at that; he couldn't help it. "I want a  _career_ , Ron," she told him fiercely. "And it has  _nothing_  to do with how much money you make. I just can't sit here at home, doing nothing of note. 'Brightest witch in a century' is worth  _nothing_ , exactly  _nothing_ , if I don't  _do_ something with my life, and right now, I'm  _not_."

"You could work," Ron offered lamely, running a hand through his hair as he wondered if, maybe, he could fix this. "I never said you couldn't. You could start up that Spew again, or whatever you wanted. I never meant to make you feel like you couldn't."

She sighed in exasperation, shaking her head decisively, as she grabbed the last armful of clothing out of the dresser and put it into the suitcase as well. "You never  _said_  I couldn't, no, but every time I brought it up, you'd get all mulish and act like my working had  _anything_  to do with your masculinity or your worth as a person, or else you'd act like all I wanted was some kind of meaningless hobby. So, I'm going to leave, and maybe then I can bloody well gain back some of my self-respect."

He looked up at her, stricken, and met her gaze. Her eyes were bright, but not with fury or tears, more with the sort of steely determination he remembered from their school days. "But, 'Mione," he replied, feeling lost. "What do you mean?"

"I  _mean_  that I'm losing myself here, in this drab little flat in this tiny little town," she told him. "I found myself spending over an  _hour_  on Monday, trying to determine whether it would be better to mend a pair of your socks with a charm or by hand, or whether I ought to just throw them out and have done with it. I haven't had any kind of worthwhile problem to solve, anything meaningful to achieve, anything worth  _doing_  that's taken an hour out of my day, in the entire eight months we've  _been_  in this little nowhere place. I'm  _bored_ , Ron. I can't  _do_  this anymore."

"We could spend more time in London," he offered. "It's not far, Apparating, and I know you liked the city a lot more. Or we could even move back there, if it would make you happy. Maybe Dad could get you a job at the Ministry, even."

She shook her head and absently cast a charm to shrink the suitcase full of clothing. "I have no intention of spending the next thirty years pushing paper around at the Ministry, hoping for a promotion that never comes, and still not  _doing_  anything worthwhile in the meantime. Besides, us moving back to London together still wouldn't fix the underlying problems."

"Underlying problems?" Ron asked, frowning. "What underlying problems? Everything has been fine, up until yesterday!"

"And that's  _one_  of the problems," she informed him tartly. "The fact that you don't even realise there  _is_  a problem, even though I've told you _repeatedly_  that I am unhappy here, that I am feeling wasted, that I want to  _accomplish_  something with my life. All you've ever done is suggest we start trying to raise a family, and I can't do that in good conscience when we're barely managing a working relationship in the first place! A baby is not a relationship patch, Ron; if it isn't working beforehand, I fail to see how complicating it immeasurably could possibly make it  _better_."

"A baby brings people together," he told her. "Its parents, most of all. But I'm not saying that because I think a baby is a patch of some sort! I'm saying it because it's true; they give the parents something to work for and towards and give them a reason to make things work. Why do you think my parents had so many kids?"

"That explains a lot," she told him darkly, rolling her eyes and pocketing the suitcase that contained all of her clothing from their bedroom. "And I don't consider that example to be a good one to follow. Besides, I've already told you, I don't think I am constitutionally  _capable_  of being a second Molly Weasley; managing a brood of children big enough to form our own Quidditch team has  _never_  been one of my life's aspirations. All of which is entirely beside the point, anyway. Everything has  _not_  been 'fine', as you put it; I don't think it ever really was. You said it yourself at the Potters' last week: we fight  _constantly_ , to the point where I don't think you even notice how much it  _bothers_  me, and I don't know that you've  _ever_ really been supportive of what I want to spend my life doing."

"What  _do_  you want to spend your life doing, Hermione?" he asked her, frustrated. "If this isn't it, if our home together, our marriage, isn't 'enough' for you… What  _is_? What is so much more important to you, that you can't wait even one more month, until after the holidays?"

"The holidays would be a sham if I stayed anyway, Ron," she replied gently, shaking her head in denial. "I'd still be leaving once they were done, and that's not fair to either of us."

"But  _why_?" he cried, pounding one fist on his thigh. "Why are you doing this to me? To us?"

She shook her head again. "I'm not doing this ' _to you_ ', Ron. I'm doing this  _for me_ , because no one else can or would. I'm going to move back to London, at least to start, and then I'm going to take an apprenticeship. Once I've  _finally_  gotten caught back up with the state of modern magic, by damn, I am going to start contributing to the depth and breadth of human knowledge." She started gesticulating passionately, talking with her hands and emphasising each point with its own motion. "I want to get my Mastership, finally, and I want to really  _do_  something with it. I want to be publishing articles in trade journals, documenting my findings for academia. I want to make life better for  _all_  people, wizard or Muggle or house elf or giant or  _anyone_  sentient. I want to be the one doing the problem solving, the one doing the research, the one making discoveries that  _matter_. I can't  _do_  that here. I can't even reasonably expect to get an apprenticeship if we're out here in this little town, and even if we stayed together, I'd be gone for  _years_  while I served my apprenticeship  _anyway_ , and that wouldn't be fair to do to you."

"I'd wait for you," he told her softly, capturing one of her hands in both of his gently and bringing it to his lips. "I don't mind, 'Mione. Truly. I just want for you to be happy. If the only thing I can do to help that is staying out of the way while you get your Masters in Arithmancy, I'll do it. I don't mind waiting for you to finish your apprenticeship, 'Mione. Not if it will make you happy."

She sighed and let her palm cup the side of his face for a moment before withdrawing her hand. "I know, Ron. But don't you see? It's not just that. It's  _everything_. And I really can't be sure that, after three years as an apprentice, I'd  _want_  to come back in the first place. A lot can change in a person in three years, and then there's my Master's trial, and… I  _still_  don't think I'm going to be ready for living in a tiny town, darning socks and minding babies, not when my career will be just barely begun. I don't know if I ever  _will_  be ready for that kind of life."

"So," he said bitterly as he stood up from the bed and stalked over to the windowsill, resting his weight on it and staring out at the overcast sky and the neighbouring house's yard. "Is this just it then? The end, of everything? We're done, that's it? No more point in trying?"

"Ron," she sighed, but she didn't walk closer to him. "All I can say is, I'm sorry."

"You're sorry," he repeated, the words choking in his throat. He closed his eyes and leaned his forehead on the cool glass; he couldn't bear to even see her reflection in the window. "You're  _sorry_ ," he sneered. " _I'm_  sorry. Sorry it came to this, sorry we even tried in the first place."

"Don't be like that," she said quietly, but he wasn't listening to her anymore.

"Tell me, Hermione, were you  _ever_  happy with me?" he asked her, still not able to open his eyes and see the answer he  _knew_  would be in hers.

"I…" she stumbled verbally, and he swallowed convulsively. "Of course, I…"

"No, don't bother giving me the pretty lie," he told her flatly. "If you weren't happy, if you didn't think you were going to be happy married to me, why did you say yes?" He raised his head from the glass, opened his eyes, and turned to face her with his arms crossed in front of his chest.

She stood there, looking small and delicate, her brows puckered in that way they got when she was worried, fidgeting with the hems of her sleeves, and looked at him. Her eyes were free of tears, but somehow still shining wetly at him. He steeled himself against it and asked again, "Well? Why? Why did you say yes? Why did you go through with it?"

She cast her eyes down to her sleeve-ends, toying with the fabric there. In a small voice, she finally replied, "I don't know. I… I guess I thought that things would be different." She swallowed convulsively, and looked back up at him, her eyes dark and serious. "I thought that maybe we'd learn to get along better, once it was just the two of us. I didn't think I would end up feeling like I couldn't pursue my dreams. I didn't think you'd be pushing for us to have children so soon. I thought we'd have our friends nearby, rather than only seeing them every few months. I didn't think I'd be an isolated Quidditch widow, with no one to talk to, nothing to do, and not  _permitted_ ," she said this with a hint of fury, "to get a real job."

"Permitted! What do you mean 'permitted'?" Ron demanded. "I've never, not once, said you couldn't get a job if you wanted one!"

"But every time I'd bring it up, you'd fight me every inch of the way!" She glared at him. "I mean, from that  _screaming_  row on our honeymoon on up to last week, when I mentioned to Ginny that I was thinking about seeing if the little bookshop down the road had any openings for salesgirls! You just about turned puce, and started reassuring Harry,  _at volume_ , that I was just being 'silly' and 'womanish' and there was 'no need' for me to get a job, because we had 'plenty of money'. It never  _once_  occurred to you that the  _money wasn't the point_."

"But, Hermione, I never wanted you to  _have_  to work!" Ron insisted.

"But what about what  _I_  wanted?" she demanded right back. "I  _want_  to work! I want to be doing something  _useful_."

"You think being here isn't useful? You think I don't appreciate you enough?" he asked, incredulous. "You think that making a home for us isn't  _good enough_  for you?"

"No, Ron, I don't!" she shouted, her voice getting shrill with anger. "It  _isn't_  good enough for me! It  _isn't_  useful! You could learn to do your  _own_  damn laundry charms and cooking charms; they're not  _that_  difficult, you just can't be  _arsed_  most days!"

"So you want me to help more around the house? Is  _that_  what this is really about?" Ron demanded, shocked. "I don't do the washing up often enough for you?"

"Don't be so bloody  _thick_ , Ronald! You never listen to a word I say, do you?" She asked scathingly, putting her fists on her hips and glaring at him. "Being a housewitch is  _not enough_  for me. It doesn't matter if you're doing the washing up or not – doing the washing up is completely irrelevant! I want to do something  _meaningful_  with my life! And I cannot do that  _here_ , and I have really started to think I cannot do it  _with you_."

"Damn it, Hermione! How can you stand there and say that to my face?" He could not believe what he was hearing.

"Because, it's  _true_. I am finished with being a useless lump at home, accomplishing nothing more exciting than darning your stupid socks and never getting to exercise my  _mind_. I need a challenge, Ron! I need to be doing something  _significant_." She shook her hair out of her eyes angrily.

" _Why_?"

"Because! When I've lived my life, I want it to have been  _worth the while_! Can't you just accept that this is important to me?"

"Not when it's taking you away from me," Ron replied. "I don't see how  _anything_  could be more important than this… Than us, than our relationship. Don't you  _see_  that?"

"But, Ron, it  _is_  more important to me. Hell, it's more important to me than  _anything_. I  _need_  to do this, before I lose any more of what makes me  _me_. Can you understand that?" She pleaded with him. "I am losing myself here, and I can't allow that. Not and stay sane. I need something different than this."

"What about what  _I_  need?" Ron responded coldly. "Doesn't that matter to you at all?"

"Oh, Ron. Of course it does… But what  _you_  need, you could get from just about any witch out there; you're young, you're good looking, you're bright…" Hermione trailed off.

"I don't want 'any witch out there'; I want  _you_ ," he insisted.

"No, you don't, Ron," she told him. "If you wanted  _me_ , you'd want the  _real_  me… The one who wants to  _do_  things with her life. Not this… pale, imitation Hermione I've devolved into these past several months. This isn't  _me_ , at least not any 'me' I'd want to recognise as myself."

He had no idea what to say to that. "Look," he said eventually. "It's getting late, and we're both hungry and tired. Let's get some take away curry, sleep on it, and discuss this further tomorrow, okay? Making this big of a decision in one night… Well, it'll sit better with both of us if we take a step back for a little bit, right? I mean, I know I can't force you to change your mind, or anything, but… I'd at least like to understand, you know?"

She looked at him warily. "I suppose," she conceded. "But don't think that some curry is going to change my mind. I  _want_  an apprenticeship, Ron. Even if I'm too old for it now."

"I know, I know," he sighed. "But, come on, Hermione. This isn't exactly how I'd figured we'd be spending our Friday night, you know?"

"Yeah, I guess," she replied, sounding slightly guilty.

"Look, you take a seat on the sofa, and I'll pop out and get the curry, if you like?" When she nodded, he continued, "Do you want your usual? The coconut curry with chicken, two stars, right? And the basmati rice on the side?"

"Sure, I guess," she replied, nodding again and looking almost as tired as he felt. "And see if they have anything that isn't carbonated to drink, please? I don't think I'm up for that, not tonight."

"Whatever you want, babe," he told her seriously. He patted his pocket to ensure he had his wallet and wand, then Apparated out.

The little curry place they usually frequented was, thankfully, still open and serving, so he grabbed the coconut curry for her, some royal biryani for himself, an order of the rice, and stopped by an off-license for a bottle of her favourite dry white wine, a pinot gris. He hated the stuff, himself, but she seemed to enjoy it and, well, it was a small enough gesture.

He popped back into their second-storey flat, purchases in hand, to find Hermione at the little writing desk they'd shoved far into one corner of the main room of their living space; the desk was frequently covered in parchment, but it looked like while he was gone, she'd done some straightening. Less than a quarter of the surface had parchment on it, and the parchments that  _were_  there looked like this month's bills, and a few sealed envelopes, with the names and addresses turned down towards the desk. Pig wasn't on his stand; Ron could only assume she'd been sending out the mail. As she noticed him, she put down her quill and turned in the chair to face him.

She looked drawn and tired, like she'd been crying but had done her level best to make sure it didn't show. She looked worn, in a way, and thin, like a piece of cloth that's been rubbed until it's nearly translucent. She looked beautiful to him, like 'home' and 'love' and 'peace' and 'joy', all embodied in one bushy brown-haired, brown-eyed package.

"I sent off my apprenticeship application," she said to him lamely, motioning at the empty owl stand on the desk. "I might hear back as soon as tomorrow."

He set the food and the bottle of wine down on the coffee table and walked over to her slowly, giving her plenty of time to react. He felt almost like he was trying to coax a wild animal into not fearing him. When he got her within arm's reach, he carefully folded her into his embrace, holding her close to his heartbeat and bending his neck so he could kiss her hair. She smelt faintly like that odd Muggle shampoo she insisted on using, all chemicals and flowers, but mostly, she smelt like  _her_. She was trembling faintly in his arms, and he held her closer. After a heartbeat's hesitation, he felt her arms come hesitantly around his waist, and he spent a moment thanking the powers that be for their small mercies. Another few heartbeats' passage, and he could feel a small patch of his collar getting damp, so he kissed the top of her head again.

He had no idea what to say, but he still drew comfort from holding her close like this. Having her nearby firmed up his resolve that he would _not_  lose her, not now and hopefully not ever. He knew his parents had not always had an idyllic life together; he knew they had worked through their problems time and time again, and he knew that he and Hermione could, too. Even if it wasn't easy for them, they could manage it. Maybe even especially if it wasn't easy; in the entire history of their relationship, it was always crisis which had brought them together, from the first adventure with the troll in the girls' loo up to helping Harry prepare to fight against Voldemort in what would have been their final year of school. He wasn't entirely sure this was the same kind of crisis, but, damn it, it's what he had available to work with, and he would bloody well work with it.

He rocked her slowly in his arms, and, after a few moments, she let out a sigh that was like all of her tension melting out of her. Her arms tightened around him briefly before she let go and pushed gently away from him; he let her, though he caught hold of her hands before she could get completely away.

"Hermione," he told her quietly, locking his eyes with her own, now dry, cinnamon ones. He could see the wet tear tracks down her cheek that hadn't been pressed against his chest. "You know that I love you, right? That I love you more than life itself?"

"Ron…" she said, despairingly as tears began to well again. She pulled one of her hands away and dashed the tears from her eyes, but he dared to feel some hope when she didn't immediately withdraw the other one from his grasp as well. "Please don't make this harder than it already is."

"It's not that," he told her seriously. "I'm not saying that to guilt trip you into staying, or anything like that. I'm just telling you because it's true. I do love you, and that's not going to change, no matter if you're working, or getting an apprenticeship, or doing your Master's trial, or staying home here and raising sprogs. I don't want to clip your wings, love. I want you to fly, as high and as free and as far as you want, as long as flying makes you happy. Even if you fly away, Hermione, I'm always going to love you.

"Waiting through an apprenticeship isn't that bad; sure, I'll miss you, and sure, it'll be hard, and sure, I may be a prat about it sometimes… But it's worth it, to me, if it brings the light back into your eyes. I just never wanted you to think that you  _had_  to do these things, if they weren't what you  _really_  wanted to do. I don't mind not always having the newest things, or making some sacrifices in other ways, if it means you can accomplish your dreams at the same time. If the sacrifice I have to make is not getting to see you other than at hols and maybe the occasional weekend, but what you're doing is what you  _want_  to be doing… Well, I can do that." He sighed. "I just want you to know that, when it's all said and done, I'm  _still_  going to love you, and I'm still going to be here for you."

"But, Ron, that isn't fair of me to ask of you – to ask of  _anyone_ , really," she told him, her eyes cast downward to the vicinity of his shoes. "An apprenticeship is three entire years, and the breaks aren't nearly as long as they were when we were in school. How could I possibly ask you to put your life on hold for  _three years_ , when I won't be there? And then the Master's trial… Even when I get back from the apprenticeship, I'm still going to be completely focused on my work for at least another year, even if I'm physically present. How can I possibly be so selfish as ask you to do that?"

"You're  _not_  asking, love," he replied softly, stroking the back of her hand with his fingers. "I'm  _offering_. There's a difference, there, babe. You're  _not_  expecting anything from me, you're not demanding it, you're not being selfish. I'm letting you know that, in the trade off between losing your company for most of a couple years and losing  _you_ , I'd take the first option every time."

She didn't seem to have a reply readied for that, so he took his other hand and tilted her chin up so he could look into her eyes. She looked sad and worried, and he could almost see the gears in her mind turning as she tried to figure out another way to refute his logic. Deciding he couldn't give her that chance, he leaned in and kissed her gently on the lips.

When she didn't immediately pull away, he held it there for a moment, and then felt the ghostly brush of her eyelashes against his cheek as her eyes shut. Carefully, slowly, he drew her closer to him, increasing the intensity of the kiss by a fraction. She didn't pull away, so he allowed the kiss to deepen, touching her lips gently with the tip of his tongue, begging entrance. She let him in, with an almost inaudible whimper, and he took the kiss slowly, drawing it out of her like a memory for a Pensieve. He wrapped his arms around her, trading his hold on her hand for one behind her shoulder blades and putting the other hand behind her waist, pulling her up against his body.

The press of her soft curves against him sharpened the ache of desperation he had been feeling since this entire conversation began, and he could feel himself harden, pressing that part of him more firmly into the cradle of her body. She whimpered again, louder this time, and suddenly began to cling to him, her arms snaking around his neck and her firm breasts pressing into his chest. He bit back a groan and kissed her fiercely, but she seemed to hear it anyway, and her arms tightened around him further.

Unwilling to relinquish her sweet mouth, he dropped his hands to her buttocks and lifted her up against him, settling her crotch against his groin. The witch in his arms wrapped her legs around his waist almost automatically, kissing him with abandon and making desperate little noises that made his cock harden almost to the point of being painful. Making a quick decision, he carried her into their bedroom and settled her onto the duvet cover, never once breaking the kiss.

He made quick work of her skirt, unbuttoning it with one hand while fondling one nipple through her blouse with the other, and had it off of her almost before she seemed to realise where they were. She made a noise as the skirt was pulled off of her that sounded almost like a sob, but she held on to him with both hands and wouldn't let him stop kissing her, so he paid it no mind for the moment. He let one hand drift down to the apex of her thighs, skimming over the edges of her knickers, while the other worked on undoing the myriad tiny buttons on the front of her shirt.

She made a small moan at that, and started tugging hard on his shirt, yanking it out of his trousers, and then let her lithe little fingers go to work on  _his_  buttons. After a moment, he felt cool air on the bare skin of his torso and removed his hands from her for the briefest moment he could manage to shrug off the offending garment, still kissing her enthusiastically. When his hands got back to her blouse, he found that she had undone the remaining buttons, and he pushed the blouse off of her shoulders.

She struggled out of it as Ron started working on unfastening her bra, that silly Muggle contraption that he  _swore_  was some sadist's modern equivalent of a chastity belt. After a few moments of fumbling with it, feeling like his fingers were two sizes too large to deal with the thing, the catch finally came loose, and she let him drag it off of her. He threw the stupid undergarment into the corner of the room, and yanked on her knickers until they finally slid off of her. He felt more than desperate to be inside of her, and couldn't gather enough self-control to go more slowly than the removal of her clothing required.

Hermione, meanwhile, had unfastened his trousers and pushed them and his pants down at the same time. He felt the pants catch for a moment on his cock, and then he felt them drop onto his feet, pooling around his ankles. He kicked them off, toed off his socks, and climbed onto the bed beside her, picking her up and moving her into the centre of the mattress without a conscious decision to do so.

He reached between her thighs and, finding her slick and wet and welcoming, settled himself between her long, lovely legs and buried himself inside her to the hilt in one smooth, long-practised motion. If kissing her was as necessary as air, the feeling of her warm cunt squeezing around his cock was more like life itself. He felt more than heard her moan into the kiss they shared, and let her have a moment to adjust to the sudden sensation of fullness before he began thrusting into her.

Each stroke was like an affirmation, filling him with determination to see  _this_  crisis through as well. He could feel a tingling sensation climb up his spine from his balls on up to his scalp, which only intensified as Hermione raked her nails down his back, finally breaking the kiss in order to pant heavily and finally cry out incoherently as her orgasm took her. Feeling the muscles of her vaginal wall clench him tight and ripple around his throbbing cock was what finally drove him over the edge as well, and he found himself spilling his seed deep inside of her as he cried out her name.

He braced himself over her, panting and unwilling to relinquish that last bit of contact until he absolutely had to, but after a few moments, he allowed his now softened member to slip from inside of her as he rolled onto the bed next to her. He gathered her close to him again and kissed her forehead gently, then each of her cheeks in turn, wondering when she had started crying again, though she was dry-eyed now, and whispered into her beautiful, bushy, curly hair, "I love you."

"I love you, too, Ron," she told him after a moment, as he dropped off into sleep, still wrapped around her slight form.

When he woke the next morning, the watery sunlight finally pricking through his eyelids, the bed, and the flat, was empty of her presence.


End file.
